6.8.17

Nnamdi Kanu beware

In the
last few weeks, the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB),
Mr. Nnamdi Kanu, who is currently on bail, granted to him by the Federal
High Court, Abuja, has increasingly engaged in activities that seem to
be alienating the bulk of the Igbo elite who fought for his release from
incarceration at Kuje Prisons, in the federal capital territory.

Kanu has stridently lampooned the
forthcoming Anambra State governorship election scheduled to hold on
November 18 and has even made and repeated his audacious declaration
that the poll would not hold. Against the background of the 2019 General
Election, he also made a sweeping statement that elections would not
hold in any part of the Igbo speaking areas of Nigeria, which in his
estimation represent Biafra Land, unless a date is announced by the
Nigerian State for holding a referendum on Biafra Independence.

As if these statements were not
disconcerting enough, members of IPOB were alleged to have disrupted a
programme at a Catholic church, in Ekwulobia, Anambra State, where
Governor Willy Obiano was in attendance.Equally troubling was the allegation that a governorship candidate was attacked during a burial ceremony at Ihiala.

As these and other troubling incidents
unfold, Anambra State has been tense as the crusade by IPOB foot
soldiers against the governorship election continues. One particular
Anambra indigene who was nettled by the IPOB stance against the election
is His Majesty, the Obi of Onitsha, Igwe Alfred Achebe. Also angered by
IPOB’s anti-election activities is the the state Chairman of Ohanaeze
Ndigbo, Chief Damian Okeke-Ogene, some religious leaders and other
members of the political class in the state.

All of these people have severally warned
IPOB and Kanu to back pedal of what they view as a foolhardy effort
that would rather imperil the state if response to their activities, the
federal government declared a state of emergency and swept away the
democratically elected government, resulting in the appointment of an
administrator, who could be a non-indigene.

Feelers indicate that Kanu is fast losing
the support of members of the Igbo elite, who stuck out their necks to
advocate for his release from Kuje prison, and even put their integrity
on the line by standing as his surety. Some among the elite paid the
N300 bail bond imposed by the court. This influential group are now
obviously being alienated as they recoil from the embarrassment, which
Kanu’s utterances against the Anambra gubernatorial election represents.

The anti-election campaign is now burning
up the internet as heated debates are being held on various social
media platforms. After news of the alleged disruption of the Catholic
church event by IPOB broke on online newsblogs, the group promptly
dissociated itself from the allegation but accused the Anambra State
government and it paid agents of masterminding the incident by
sponsoring some boys to cause crisis in order to label the group as a
violent group. This, the Media and Publicity Secretary of IPOB, Mr. Emma
Powerful said, was intended to instigate the security forces of the
Federal government to clampdown on its members.

Not long after, a news story went viral
on social media that Kanu visit Lagos for a mammoth rally would
literally shut down the metropolis in the same manner that it happened
in Abakaliki, the Ebonyi State capital, when he visited the place.
Again, IPOB denied the report as fake news, stating it had no such plans
in the immediate future.

Baring his mind on the tenuous issue of
Kanu’s carryings on since he has been out of Kuja Prisons on bail, a
candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Hon. Ikenna Unachuwku,
who contested for the Anambra State House of Assembly election in 2015,
to represent Idemili North constituency, cautioned Kanu to rethink his
bid to stop forthcoming governorship election, warning that the effort
“would ruin him.”

His words: “Election in Nigeria is a
constitutional issue and people have the power to exercise their
franchise, we are still in Nigeria for now, we are not yet in Biafra and
we have to look at what the Constitution says. If there is no election
in any part of the country a state of emergency would be declared,
eventually the military takes over and it will take the federal
government six months to conduct fresh election. So, it is a very
sensitive issue. Whoever that said that election will not hold but wants
referendum should first of all let the election be held and then the
referendum will come. You must be part of a system for you to workout
your objective in that particular system.

“My advise is that Kanu and his members
should recognise that candidates do not conduct elections. IPOB members
should channel their energy to the Independent National Electoral
Commission, Abuja, to tell INEC that election will not hold in Anambra.
It is not when you see an innocent gubernatorial candidate, you tell him
there will be no election. It is his right to vie and our right to
vote. On that day I may decide to go or not to go to cast my vote, some
of us don’t have voters card, you cannot force anybody not to vote.

“The pictures of those that attacked the
church wore T-shirts with Biafra flag and IPOB logo. It is only the
members that can identify the real members or fake ones since they are
denying it. They said they are organized, they should have their
register to know who is who in their group but they can’t deny the
cameras, and no masquerade will come with IPOB uniform. My advice is
that they should not attack governorship candidates, if we come out that
day and we didn’t see INEC officials then we will go home, so they
should go and tell INEC not to come and conduct election in the state.”

A lecturer at the Department of Medical Laboratory Sciences, NnamdiAzikiwe
University, Awka, Dr. Patrick Manafa in his remarks condemned IPOB for
saying that election will not be held in the state, describing it as the
highpoint of lawlessness and trying to step beyond his boundaries in
the struggle.

He expressed displeasure that Kanu has
surrounded himself with people that lack intellectual capacity to advise
him properly, on how get to get what he is aspiring for, adding that he
is fighting a personal war. He said Kanu was trying to replace late Dim
Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu even without consulting the elders of Igbo
land as well as wanting to make himself the supreme leader of Ndigbo,
which he said is not practicable.

“Kanu should know that well meaning Igbo
people including the Ohanaeze Ndigbo led by Chief Nnia Nwodo, who he has
been insulting, made efforts to free him from prison. When he came out
of prison, I was glad he was going round visiting those people but
suddenly he turned against them and even started insulting traditional
rulers including the revered Obi of Onitsha, it is pitiable. That is not
the way to go, he should sit down and talk with intelligent people that
will advise him. He should not be carried away by the crowd he
controls,” Manafa said.

Speaking further, he said: “He should be
very, very careful, I don’t even know the reason he doesn’t want
election to hold in Anambra state; he is not from Anambra, there is a
seating governor in Abia state his home state, he has not told him to
resign. He does not know that this election is different from
sit-at-home order he is now using to claim to be very popular. There is
no popular political party that does not have a candidate and their
followers will come out that day to vote.

“So, let him stop all this violent
approach. He said the group is nonviolent but from all indications and
from what we are seeing, he is a very violent person. How can you go to
church to disrupt churchservice?
I don’t believe in their denial over the attack on the church because
they keep saying that there would be no election in the state. Who else
would go and disrupt that programme? If they believe that they have
people to disrupt political campaigns in the state, they should get
ready because more political rallies and campaigns would be held in the
state before the election. Kanu knows that people are now starting to
hate him, his popularity is draining day by day; let him be very careful
in his activities. He should go and seek advise from his elders,”
Manafa advised.

But when he was contacted on the phone,
to react to the claims that the group was losing support among the elite
and the generality of the people, IPOB spokesman, Emma Powerful, stated
that Kanu and the group were not losing any support as alleged.

His words: “We don’t know what you mean
by losing support because with the notable exception of very few
political jobbers, our constituency which is the people, remains intact
and supportive of our stance to boycott the elections.

“We are not expecting those in the pay of
the Hausa Fulani masters or the few charlatans, whose only means of
livelihood depends on events associated with electoral cycles to be
supportive of the call to boycott the elections. At IPOB we have no time
for fair weather friends. We derive our strength from our consistent
approach to Biafra’s restoration, not by pandering to every fanciful
idea designed to perpetuate the misery of our people under the guise of
some ill-thought out pseudo-intellectualism that lacks an appreciation
of the dire mess we Biafrans, not just Igbo, are in as a people.”

The group expressed concern over the use
of its name and that of its leader to cause crisis and attacks in the
recent time. “We are naturally concerned but we believe that our people
and the wider civilised world can discern what is correct and what
isn’t. Publishers and bloggers are in the business of attracting
readership and traffic to their sites so the use of the name of our
leader to serve those ends can be understood if not condoned by us.

“In the age of round the clock media
coverage, especially given the overbearing influence of new media, it
should not come to anyone as a surprise that a lot of fake stories and
outright fabrications are out there concerning our leader. As unwelcome
as some of the malicious publications are, we respect the sanctity of
free speech and would resist any censorship of thought or speech.”

On the danger that Igbo leaders may not
rally round Kanu again in case anything happens to him, Powerful said:
“We welcome their consistency in this regard because they can see that
our leader means well for our people and will continue to make personal
sacrifices in order to set all of us free from the yoke that Nigeria has
come to represent.
It would be preferable if their support were to be
unconditional because our enemies often take advantage of their
indecisiveness to drive a wedge between us thereby making it easier to
divide and conquer us as a people.They need to be consistent and principled, not worried about being politically correct all the time to please the North.”

He further stated that no sensible
selfless leader, Igbo or otherwise, can come out to condemn the boycott
of the elections if they have the interest of our people at heart as
some of them claim.

On the way forward, he said that the
group continue to pursue passive resistance and civil disobedience in
line with the principles of non-violent agitation towards
self-determination.

He added: “We shall intensify our
diplomatic offensive, invest more in the education sector, especially in
the area of public enlightenment, history of Biafra and science; deepen
the bond between genuine freedom fighters from across the South East
and South South, form alliances with new friends within and outside
Nigeria while consolidating the ones we have already made. We shall
continue to build consensus across divides to ensure that we bring the
miserable existence of this British nightmare we know as Nigeria, to an
end.”